Must We Import Our Scientific Talent As We Do Televisions?

March 14, 1988|By Joan Beck.

Hey, never mind all the fuss about how much worse American young people do in science and math than those in other countries. If we can`t produce enough brains ourselves, we`ll just do what we do for VCRs and TV sets. We`ll import them.

We already have a good start.

Of the 60 scholarship winners in the last six years of the Westinghouse Science Talent Search, 33 were born in other countries or are immigrants`

offspring. This year, of the 10 winners one was born in Taiwan and three have foreign-born parents. One of the finalists escaped from Vietnam on a boat eight years ago. Forty percent of the students in the two high schools which consistently do best in the Westinghouse are of Asian descent.

Of all the Ph.D. degrees in engineering granted by American colleges in 1986, 60 percent went to foreign students.

Of all the patents awarded last year by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, 47 percent went to inventors from other countries. In 1960, only one- sixth of Americn patents were granted to non-Americans.

Nothing suggests the situation will improve-at least for years.

American children continue to lag behind their contemporaries in other countries in science and math, according to an accumulation of fresh and worrisome evidence. They are not keeping up with the rest of the

industrialized world as students. And that inevitably will mean this country will be short of scientific brain power for decades to come.

The newest bad news comes from a 17-nation study of science achievement conducted by the International Association for the Evaluation of Education Achievement (IEA). A preliminary report on the comprehensive studies to be published in 1989 is full of sobering facts that should shake this country out of its dangerous complacency. But it probably won`t.

For example, U.S. 5th graders rank 8th among 15 countries tested at that level. By 9th grade, Americans kids slip to 15th out of 17 nations, outscoring only high schoolers in Hong Kong and the Philippines. Fourteen-year-olds in Hungary, Japan, the Netherlands, Canada, Finland, Sweden, Korea, Poland, Norway, Australia, England and Italy do better.

Even those who are supposed to be the brightest of American teens don`t measure up well. Seniors taking second-year biology (generally considered an advanced placement course) finish last in international comparisons. Those in second-year chemistry classes come in 11th out of 13 countries tested. Second- year physics students at least manage to rank ninth.

Last month, researchers at the American Association for the Advancement of Science meeting lamented the sorry state of math achievement in American schools in comparison with other nations. For example, although students at some grade levels do somewhat better, American high school seniors test lower in math than peers from 18 industralized nations, according to the Second International Mathematics Study.

What`s most discouraging is that none of this is new. The deficiencies of American students and the superiority particularly of Asian youngsters has for years been as clear as the ``Made in Japan`` and ``Made in Taiwan`` labels on electronic products sold here.

Some of the reasons are also clear-and have been for years. Japanese parents, for example, are much more involved in their children`s education than are American families. They encourage, help, challenge, expect and insist that their children do well. School days are longer. So are school years. Teachers get higher pay and prestige. Japanese children expect to work hard in school; many Americans kids want to be entertained. Math and science curricula advance too slowly, repeat too much and are too limited, educators involved in the comparison studies say.

In the United States, writing reports on school reform has become a major industry, but nothing much changes. Stories about top science students clearly show how important the role of parents is in their children`s education, but the moral goes unheeded in millions of families.

Of course, we can continue to provide a market for scientific talent from abroad-just as we do for TV sets and calculators. But it should also be obvious that we will pay heavy penalties for allowing ourselves to become a second-class scientific country-a Third World nation, actually, some critics mourn. It isn`t just a matter of Westinghouse prizes, but jobs, industries, trade balances, pride, national leadership and personal satisfaction.